One of the world’s most sacred places is being turned into a luxury mega-resort
14 hours agoYolande KnellBBC News, Jerusalem
Universal Images Group via Getty ImagesFor years, visitors would venture up Mount Sinai with a Bedouin guide to watch the sunrise over the pristine, rocky landscape or go on other Bedouin-led hikes.
Now one of Egypt’s most sacred places – revered by Jews, Christians and Muslims – is at the heart of an unholy row over plans to turn it into a new tourism mega-project.
Known locally as Jabal Musa, Mount Sinai is where Moses is said to have been given the Ten Commandments. Many also believe that this is the place where, according to the Bible and the Quran, God spoke to the prophet from the burning bush.
The 6th century St Catherine’s Monastery, run by the Greek Orthodox Church, is also there – and seemingly its monks will stay on now that Egyptian authorities, under Greek pressure, have denied wanting to close it.
However, there is still deep concern about how the long-isolated, desert location – a Unesco World Heritage site comprising the monastery, town and mountain – is being transformed. Luxury hotels, villas and shopping bazaars are under construction there.
It is also home to a traditional Bedouin community, the Jebeleya tribe. Already the tribe, known as the Guardians of St Catherine, have had their homes and tourist eco-camps demolished with little or no compensation. They have even been forced to take bodies out of their graves in the local cemetery to make way for a new car park.
The project may have been presented as desperately needed sustainable development which will boost tourism, but it has also been imposed on the Bedouin against their will, says Ben Hoffler, a British travel writer who has worked closely with Sinai tribes.
“This is not development as the Jebeleya see it or asked for it, but how it looks when imposed top-down to serve the interests of outsiders over those of the local community,” he told the BBC.
“A new urban world is being built around a Bedouin tribe of nomadic heritage,” he added. “It’s a world they have always chosen to remain detached from, to whose construction they did not consent, and one that will change their place in their homeland forever.”
Locals, who number about 4,000, are unwilling to speak directly about the changes.
Ben HofflerSo far, Greece is the foreign power which has been most vocal about the Egyptian plans, because of its connection to the monastery.
Tensions between Athens and Cairo flared up after an Egyptian court ruled in May that St Catherine’s – the world’s oldest continuously used Christian monastery – lies on state land.
After a decades-long dispute, judges said that the monastery was only “entitled to use” the land it sits on and the archaeological religious sites which dot its surroundings.
Archbishop Ieronymos II of Athens, head of the Church of Greece, was quick to denounce the ruling.
“The monastery’s property is being seized and expropriated. This spiritual beacon of Orthodoxy and Hellenism is now facing an existential threat,” he said in a statement.
In a rare interview, St Catherine’s longtime Archbishop Damianos told a Greek newspaper the decision was a “grave blow for us… and a disgrace”. His handling of the affair led to bitter divisions between the monks and his recent decision to step down.
The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem pointed out that the holy site – over which it has ecclesiastical jurisdiction – had been granted a letter of protection by the Prophet Muhammad himself.
It said that the Byzantine monastery – which unusually also houses a small mosque built in the Fatimid era – was “an enshrinement of peace between Christians and Muslims and a refuge of hope for a world mired by conflict”.
While the controversial court ruling remains in place, a flurry of diplomacy ultimately culminated in a joint declaration between Greece and Egypt ensuring the protection of St Catherine’s Greek Orthodox identity and cultural heritage.
Ben Hoffler‘Special gift’ or insensitive interference?
Egypt began its state-sponsored Great Transfiguration Project for tourists in 2021. The plan includes opening hotels, eco-lodges and a large visitor centre, as well as expanding the small nearby airport and a cable car to Mount Moses.
The government is promoting the development as “Egypt’s gift to the entire world and all religions”.
“The project will provide all tourism and recreational services for visitors, promote the development of the town [of St Catherine] and its surrounding areas while preserving the environmental, visual, and heritage character of the pristine nature, and provide accommodation for those working on St Catherine’s projects,” Housing Minister Sherif el-Sherbiny said last year.
While work does appear to have stalled, at least temporarily, due to funding issues, the Plain of el-Raha – in view of St Catherine’s Monastery – has already been transformed. Construction is continuing on new roads.
This is where the followers of Moses, the Israelites, are said to have waited for him during his time on Mount Sinai. And critics say the special natural characteristics of the area are being destroyed.
Detailing the outstanding universal value of the site, Unesco notes how “the rugged mountainous landscape around… forms a perfect backdrop for the Monastery”.
It says: “Its siting demonstrates a deliberate attempt to establish an intimate bond between natural beauty and remoteness on the one hand and human spiritual commitment on the other.”
Ben HofflerBack in 2023, Unesco highlighted its concerns and called on Egypt to stop developments, check their impact and produce a conservation plan.
This has not happened.
In July, World Heritage Watch sent an open letter calling on Unesco’s World Heritage Committee to place the St Catherine’s area on the List of World Heritage Sites in Danger.
Campaigners have also approached King Charles as patron of the St Catherine Foundation, which raises funds to help conserve and study the monastery’s heritage with its collection of valuable ancient Christian manuscripts. The King has described the site as “a great spiritual treasure that should be maintained for future generations”.
The mega-project is not the first in Egypt to draw criticism for a lack of sensitivity to the country’s unique history.
But the government sees its series of grandiose schemes as key to reinvigorating the flagging economy.
Egypt’s once-thriving tourism sector had begun to recover from the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic when it was hit by the brutal war in Gaza and a new wave of regional instability. The government has declared an aim of reaching 30 million visitors by 2028.
Under successive Egyptian governments, commercial development of the Sinai has been carried out without consulting the indigenous Bedouin communities.
The peninsula was captured by Israel during the 1967 Middle East War and only returned to Egypt after the two countries signed a peace treaty in 1979. The Bedouin have since complained of being treated like second-class citizens.
The construction of Egypt’s popular Red Sea destinations, including Sharm el-Sheikh, began in South Sinai in the 1980s. Many see similarities with what is happening at St Catherine’s now.
“The Bedouin were the people of the region, and they were the guides, the workers, the people to rent from,” says Egyptian journalist Mohannad Sabry.
“Then industrial tourism came in and they were pushed out – not just pushed out of the business but physically pushed back from the sea into the background.”
Ben HofflerAs with the Red Sea locations, it is expected that Egyptians from elsewhere in the country will be brought in to work at the new St Catherine’s development. However, the government says it is also “upgrading” Bedouin residential areas.
St Catherine’s Monastery has endured many upheavals through the past millennium and a half but, when the oldest of the monks at the site originally moved there, it was still a remote retreat.
That began to change as the expansion of the Red Sea resorts brought thousands of pilgrims on day trips at peak times.
In recent years, large crowds would often be seen filing past what is said to be the remnants of the burning bush or visiting a museum displaying pages from the Codex Sinaiticus – the world’s oldest surviving, nearly complete, handwritten copy of the New Testament.
Now, even though the monastery and the deep religious significance of the site will remain, its surroundings and centuries-long ways of life look set to be irreversibly changed.
More weekend picks